Sangareddy: AICC vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Thursday recreated his grandmother and former PM Indira Gandhi’s “1979 magic” in Sangareddy.
He addressed the public meeting from the same venue from where Indira addressed a meeting exactly 38 years ago in 1979.
Telangana Congress leaders, party cadre and local people recollected the uncanny similarities between the public meetings addressed by Indira and Mr Gandhi.
Indira launched the Congress poll campaign in 1979 when Congress was wiped out from national politics due to Janata Party wave in 1977 elections and returned to power with a thumping majority in 1980 by winning the Medak Lok Sabha seat under which Sangareddy falls.
After nearly four decades, the Congress is again going through a lean patch, after 2014 poll debacle and subsequently losing almost all major Assembly elections since then. Mr Gandhi chose the same venue for public meeting attempting to revive Congress’ political fortunes.
Some locals said they witnessed the same sight, enthusiasm and chants that dominated the streets of Sangareddy when Indira visited it in 1979.
Narsaiah, a 65-year old Congress activist, who has been associated with the party for four decades, said, “I was 25 year old then, when Indira Gandhi addressed the meeting at the same ground. At that time, she promised jobs to youth. Soon after becoming Medak MP and PM, she set up many industries and factories in and around Medak district, due to which one lakh youth got jobs.”
